Four To The End (prev Shifting Lines) Book Three (Marauders Era)

Chapter One Hundred-Twenty-Four - In A Werewolf's House

Author's note: CW emetophobia

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Sirius hadn't kissed Landers, though they were going to go on a date during the Hogsmeade visit. Most of Friday evening was spent listening to Sirius talk about Landers, and Peter asking him questions while they played Wild Adventures. James and Remus were mostly quiet except when James teased Sirius. Then, once it got late enough and the common room emptied out... things shifted to the fact they were going to Remus's house the next day. Remus kept his face still, staring at the board and trying not to panic. He had... sort've forgotten about that. He had planned on going in and cleaning things up and now he didn't have time, unless he went in the morning before they went.

"Can we put it off?" he finally asked.

"You said the eleventh," James reminded him. "It was your choice."

Remus hung his head. "All right, yeah."

They went to bed at three and Remus didn't get to sleep for another hour. He tossed and turned, trying not to feel too nauseated about the idea. He finally set his alarm for seven, planning on going in to clean... but at seven he turned his alarm off and just went back to sleep until James woke him up at eleven.

Remus swore and fell out of bed, flailing under the blanket. "I was supposed to get up earlier!" he protested, finally yanking the blanket off of himself. "It's eleven?"

"Why were you supposed to get up sooner?" Sirius asked.

"I had—things to do," he said, getting up and brushing himself off. When had they discussed going to his house? Originally the afternoon, but... maybe he could push it till evening. "I have... I need to do some things, for a bit. I—I'll see you later."

James snagged him as he tried to run, and Remus was afraid James would want to go to the house right now. "In your pajamas?" he asked instead, smirking.

Remus looked down, blushed, and then dove onto his bed behind the curtains to change first. "I'll be back later."

"What things do you need to do?" Sirius asked.

Remus flopped on his back, yanking his jeans up over his hips. Clean. "School stuff. Important. For the exams." He pulled a vest on then an old sweatshirt before tumbling out of his bed again. "I'll catch up with you later today."

Sirius looked down at him. "You haven't eaten yet today, are you skipping lunch too?"

"I'll—I'll grab something. I promise. Bye!" He shoved his feet into his trainers and then took off, not even bothering to brush his hair. He had no idea how long it would take to scrub as much of the bloodstains out as he could... he just hoped he could do it.

*

A few hours later Remus was exhausted. He had nicked cleaning supplies from Filch and spent every minute trying to get his house clean. He had scrubbed at all the bloodstains as hard as he could—thankfully some were removed and some at least faded, although there were still some he couldn't get out. He cleaned up the few pee stains as well, glad he didn't go to the bathroom too often as a wolf. He repaired the furniture as best he could and then tidied up. Swept all the fur, found a few bits of dried, shriveled flesh, and tossed out the pillows that had been destroyed beyond repair.

Then he collapsed on the couch, breathing hard as he surveyed the living room to make sure nothing else was—ahhh, the scratch marks on the wall! He ran over and tried to fix the deep gouges in the wood. Those were harder to fix than the furniture, and he couldn't really do too much. Finally he put an illusion spell over most of them and moved a picture over the worst gouges.